– Life Unexpected continues to hang on to hope. It’s stayed reasonably steady in the ratings, although not at a level where I’m confident of its renewal. For those fans wanting another straw to hang onto, while it’s not at Gossip Girl levels of CW wished for female 18-34 ratings, it at least skews towards women, with about 50% higher female 18-34 ratings (1.15) as male 18-34 (.75) last night. I would not expect a decision on it until the last minute (no later than May 20).

Note that Life Unexpected’s ratings Index includes only new episodes, while the rest of the CW show Indexes contain many repeat airings, so it’s difficult to make an apples to apples comparisons without looking at individual episode numbers. That’s why the show is colored orange in the list with an Index of 1.07.

One Tree Hill is on far more solid ratings ground. Conventional wisdom is that One Tree Hill renewal is dependent on contractual issues. It has the ratings for renewal.

Melrose Place has no role left to be played other than canceled.

*I have frozen The Beautiful Life’s Index at its value the week of cancellation.

This is a breakdown of CW scripted shows and their renewal and cancellation prospects. Here are links to the other networks:

The Renew/Cancel Index is a show’s Season To Date adults 18-49 rating divided by its network’s Season to Date average 18-49 rating. If a show’s season to date 18-49 ratings average equalled its network’s 18-49 average, the show would have an Index of 1.00. Without special factors, scripted shows that were more than 10% below their network’s average are typically canceled by the end of the broadcast primetime season.

Factors that could cause a show to be renewed with well below average index:

(F) -Fridays: Shows airing on Fridays have been renewed with significantly lower than average Indexes.

(T) – Third Party: Shows that have a portion of their cost underwritten by a 3rd party can be renewed with substantially lower ratings.

(P) – Produced by the network’s production company – For shows on the bubble, being produced by the network’s corporate production company can be a survival advantage. For real losers, it’s unlikely to help.